David Green: The Biblical Billionaire Backing The Evangelical Movement

“If I die without food or without eternal salvation, I want to die without food.”

“Even the most generous Christian philanthropists often don’t see the purpose of their giving,” says Dr. Mark Rutland, the new ORU president and founder of the Global Servants evangelical ministry. “There are impulse givers, people who give to their alma mater or their church or some particular ministry with which they become familiar–but the Greens are Kingdom givers. … They consider it an honor; they consider it a mission.”

Abroad, Green is putting Scripture into the hands of nonbelievers. “People ask, ‘How are you going to get a Bible to everyone in the world?’ We’re doing it,” Green says. Through foundations he supports, he has already distributed nearly 1.4 billion copies of Gospel literature in more than 100 countries, mostly in Africa and Asia. The OneHope Foundation targets children age 4 to 14 with Scripture tailored to them, while Every Home for Christ sends evangelists with Bible booklets door-to-door in some of the poorest countries on Earth. “It’s not like you give them that but don’t give them food; you do both,” Green stresses. But the priority is clear: “If I die without food or without eternal salvation, I want to die without food.”

Green and his family show what giving looks like “from a biblical perspective,” says Rob Hoskins, president of OneHope. “For high-net-worth individuals, particularly people that created first-generation wealth, to look at the growth of their business, not for them to maintain a lavish lifestyle or accumulate generational wealth but for the cause of Christ–they’re a shining light in the Christian community.”

Green makes a distinction between “good” causes–employing people or researching cures for disease, for example–and “great” causes, which will echo beyond our temporal existence. “I don’t know how to get anywhere else once you start with that one thing: that the Bible is God’s word,” he says. And Green has taken God’s word digital. He sponsors the YouVersion Bible app for mobile phones, equipped to offer almost 300 different versions of Scripture in 144 languages–all available at the tap of your finger. It has already been downloaded more than 50 million times.

Perhaps his most personal mission yet is just gearing up. Green is creating a permanent, public home for his collection of handwritten scrolls, rare books and ancient cuneiform tablets the family has amassed over the decades. At 44,000 artifacts, it appears to be the largest private collection of biblical antiquities in the world. Some of the most precious pieces are currently housed in a modest temperature-controlled storage room in the Hobby Lobby warehouse. It’s not much bigger than your average walk-in closet, but Green steps lightly as he enters. He’s treading on sacred ground. “This isn’t just some book that someone made up,” Green says as he gingerly takes one Bible down from the shelf. “It’s God, it’s history, and we want to show that.” He purchased a building in Washington, D.C. with the hope of opening the Museum of the Bible, an expanded version of a current traveling exhibition, within three years.

While he has donated as much money to evangelical causes as anyone alive, Green is more humbled by the memory of his parents’ putting their last dime on the collection plate. His father was a small-time preacher who bounced from one tiny congregation to another, eventually landing at a church of just 35 attendees in Altus, Okla., a speck of a town amid a sea of cattle ranches and cotton fields. The family subsisted on hand-me-down clothes and food donations from the congregation, going weeks without having meat to put on the table–but that didn’t stop Green’s mother from donating to the church. His wife of 51 years, Barbara, recalls her mother-in-law with reverence. “We don’t give out of our need, we give out of our surplus,” she says. “David’s mother gave out of her need. She would give stuff when she might not have something to replace that with, yet she stepped out in faith.”

All of Green’s five siblings followed his parents’ example and became either pastors themselves or pastors’ wives. Green himself took the faith down a less traveled path. After flailing his way through middle school (he had to repeat seventh grade), he jumped at the opportunity to do a work-study program during his junior year of high school. As a stock boy at McClellan’s general store, where he would later meet Barbara, Green spent most of his time sweeping floors and unloading boxes for 60 cents an hour, but he fell in love with the romantic idea of buying something for 10 cents and selling it for 20.

“This isn’t just some book that someone made up.”

After serving briefly in the Air Force Reserve and marrying his sweetheart, the 29-year-old Green was working as a manager at TG&Y, another five-and-dime, when he started the small business that would become Hobby Lobby. Borrowing $600 to buy equipment, Green teamed up with another store manager in 1970 to manufacture his first of many arts and crafts products: miniature picture frames. Soon the Green family kitchen table was converted into factory space manned by Barbara and the couple’s two young boys, Steve and Mart, who churned out frames for an allowance of 7 cents apiece. In 1972 he opened his first store, a 300-square-foot space in Oklahoma City.

Soon, with the help of a bead-buying craze among hippies (“God bless them,” Green says), he upgraded to a bigger location. Three years later he opened a second store in town, with 6,000 square feet of retail space, and quit his regular day job at TG&Y–against Barbara’s wishes. “She wasn’t on board at first,” Green says. “She was real comfortable with me working at TG&Y. They were doing $2 billion in sales; we did $100,000. Of course, they’re gone now, and we’re making $3 billion.”

Post Your Comment

Post Your Reply

Forbes writers have the ability to call out member comments they find particularly interesting. Called-out comments are highlighted across the Forbes network. You'll be notified if your comment is called out.

I have, and it’s a hilarious. Though there are better reads, more worth your time. Thankfully, in the end, he will end up like the rest of us, dead and decomposing in the ground. To bad he uses what he has built to push such religion.

I have. Particularly liked the bit that had something to do with Heaven, rich men and camels.

Seriously, if you do read the Bible you will see that it is impossible to get into heaven. Too much contradictory small print.

When people realise that the function of religious dogma is not to stop you ‘sinning’ (whatever that means) but to make you feel guilty when you do they will stop being religious. Then you can pay your church an appropriate sum to buy your forgiveness. If you don’t have money you can do ‘good works’. Then go and do it all over again. The church gets richer and buys more property and Lear jets and you feel better repeatedly.

Until they realise this they will hop from church to church cherry picking the bits of their dogma they agree with and rejecting that they do not. What a great scam. The real question is how does someone so credulous get to be a billionaire. Maybe the giving is a front to hide something really heinous. It usually is. Time is truths greatest ally.

I hear what you are saying and can tell you know some things about the Bible and Christianity but there are a few things you might want to consider. It is true that EVERY major religion in the world says that you have to do good works (giving money is a good work) in order to somehow please an angry god. Once you’ve done that you have to go through a rigorous routine of prayer, works, and giving. In the end, you still might not make it. Christianity however is the one and only “religion” in the world that is different. The Bible teaches that we are sinners, every person on this earth. We have all done wrong, hurtful, and immoral things. There is no way for us to please God. There is nothing we can do and there isn’t anything we can offer Him that He will accept as a payment as entrance into heaven. But, the Bible teaches that God, knowing that we had no hope, sent His Son to die for our sins, on a cross, in our place. That may sound like a “myth” but the Bible isn’t the only book written that documents Jesus’ life. There are at least 5 other Roman historians who have documented the life and death of Jesus. It’s my hope that you assume I am lying in order to find out for yourself. Christianity is unique. The Bible teaches that we get to receive heaven as a gift from God if we give Jesus absolute control of our lives. And, you misquoted the Bible story you referenced at the beginning of your post. A rich man came to Jesus asking Him what he could do to inherit eternal life. Jesus told Him to keep the first 4 commandments. This man said he had kept them ALL from his youth. This is absolutely impossible because if you ever read Exodus 20, you will find out why. But Jesus told him that he needed to sell everything he had and follow him…then he could have heaven. This man is the only man recorded in the Bible to walk away from Jesus sad because he owned many things. Then Jesus said that FEW rich people would receive heaven. It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to see heaven. The question is…WHY? Selling your possessions doesn’t give you a free ride into heaven. Jesus was testing this guy. The Bible clearly teaches that you cannot live for money AND live for God at the same time. You either love God or you love riches/money. That’s why MOST rich people will never see heaven. They are banking on their riches and that’s what they live for. However, there are rich people who love God and God blesses them with riches. I’m not sure if you will ever read this but maybe you should spend some time reading the Bible. Even if you don’t read it to get converted…you will at least know the real position of the people you are opposing. The truth is. You are going to die and one of three things are going to happen to you. You will either be annihilated, you will be reincarnated, or you will go to heaven/hell. It is my hope that you really search for the truth and find out why you believe what you believe. If you believe you will be annihilated…why do you believe that? What is your proof? How do you know? The Bible says that it is appointed once for a man to die, then comes the judgement. I pray that you choose Jesus because He has already taken the judgement for you if you receive Him. Figure out who He really is and what He did for you. If you put your faith in him, you WILL have eternal life. Not because you feel like it and not because I say so. The Bible, a book that has withstood the scrutiny of thousands of dictators over the centuries and that has never been proven wrong in any archeological dig says that Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life and no man sees heaven apart from Him. I respect your views and I believe that your ideas about Christianity have been shaped by self proclaiming Christians using the Bible to justify their own agendas but the Bible speaks for itself. Eternity is a long time to suffer when the only thing you had to do to escape was ask Jesus to save you…Think about it.

Excellent article! God bless you Mr. Green! Years ago I had determined the Hobby Lobby store here in Pensacola must be run by Christians, great to see the story behind the store! Thank you for all you do to advance the Kingdom! Mark Taylor – Pensacola, FL